Cruise missiles were launched from a height of 3 miles to hit land targets a proving ground in Buryatia. Pilots were practicing the air-to-air refueling of Russian TU-95MS strategic bombers that are a part of the military exercise Vostok-2018. The scale is impressive. Suffice to say, today a reverse scenario was practiced as well, an air attack by an alleged enemy, which was successfully reflected by combat units with S-300, S-400, and Pantsir-S1 missile systems. They advanced to the firing positions and were for to combat in no time.
The Defense Minister is personally in charge of the exercise. Sergey Shoygu monitored the work of command points at the Zugol zone in Transbaikal. He was accompanied by his North Korean colleague, and on Thursday the Russian military will be joined by the Chinese. Numerous foreign journalists and military attaches observe the exercise. There's never been such a thing in modern Russia. It's definitely a record in terms of number of personnel and weaponry. The key words are, however, modern Russia. But there are parallels to the Soviet past, too.
Stanislav Bernwald will tell us about them.
- Greetings, Stanislav.
- Hello.
- Today's the anniversary of the ending of Exercise Zapad-81.
- This day 37 years ago Zapad-81 came to end. From that very day, our Western partners wondered if showing off their arsenal was worth it or not.
Experience, planning, and communication were the three major components of Zapad-81. Such an exercise was and still is unprecedented in NATO countries. 100,000 troops and almost every service branch were involved in the exercise, which ended with a landing of the 7th Airborne Division at one of the zones near Minsk.
"Today, tanks, self-propelled guns, anti-aircraft and anti-tank are at the personnel's service".
Andrey Koshkin, political expert: "After Exercise Zapad-81 none of the Western military experts or leaders wanted to shift from political relations to military ones. It was a wake-up call for those hawks that had been constantly seeking a military confrontation with the Soviet Union. placing their stake on nuclear weapons".
Actually, the Soviet Union approached the largest exercise in its history having developed a unique command system via strategic link combat management. It replaced the old manual control from the General Staff. The innovation has become a prototype of modern automated command and control systems.
Andrey Koshkin: "The automated command and control system successfully developed and used in the exercise provided full coordination. It showed that the control of troops reached a new level unobtainable to the Western adversaries".
In terms of modern weaponry and number of personnel Exercise Zapad-81 was surpassed decades after, in 2014, during the surprise military exercise Vostok-2014 which involved 150,000 troops, 1,500 tanks, 70 warships, and 120 aircraft.
Now, Vostok 2018 is the largest military exercise in the history of Russian Armed Forces.
Boris Rozhin, expert: "It shows the ability of the Russian Army to operate very large groups of forces, redeploy troops at long distances and organize their effective communication. This is a highly important aspect in terms of providing for the defense of a country. This has been demonstrated quite visually. And the number indicates that we do not talk about an exercise in a separate Okrug here, we talk about a specific exercise for the main part of our Armed Forces. It shows the level of strategic defense capabilities of this country".
Back then, in 1981, Russian troops were accompanied by the Warsaw Pact states. In today's exercise, Vostok-2018, our troops are brothers in arms with the Chinese and Mongolians.
Ivan Konovalov, Strategic Conjuncture Center: "Most importantly, it's a sign that NATO's attempt to isolate Russia, military-wise for one, has failed. We are developing military cooperation with a number of countries. And we vividly demonstrate that the cooperation with China has huge prospects".
More than a thousand foreign journalists and military attaches are monitoring the exercise closely and that's no surprise. Some of them see a demonstration of geopolitical shifts in Eurasia, others see the triumph of the Russian Armed Forces modernization. Staying vividly alert, the American Washington Post states that China participating in the largest military exercise is nothing but a clear sign to the West that once historical rivals under American pressure in the East are becoming reliable allies.
- Stanislav Bernwald on the historical experience.
